Overcoming challenges in Global Software Development: The role of Brokers Christina Manteli, Bart van den Hooff, Hans van Vliet VU University Amsterdam {c.manteli, b.j.vanden.hooff, j.c.van.vliet}@vu.nl Wilco van Duinkerken Olery BV wilcovanduinkerken@olery.com Abstract—A common collaboration structure in global soft- ware development (GSD) is clustering, wherein people tend to be closer to others with whom they share common characteristics. Clusters often create barriers in communication, coordination and expertise awareness between remote teams, restraining the development of transactive memory (TM). In order to overcome such barriers, the role of brokers has emerged. In this paper, we examine the role of brokers as facilitators in the development of transactive memory. We use social network theory to analyze the collaboration of an EU-funded project, where development teams come from different partners and different locations. Our results suggest that task-based clusters emerge and that project members who coordinate activities as well as those who contribute to the code development act as brokers. Our empirical evaluation shows that clustering has a negative effect on TM and that brokers can moderate that effect. Keywords—Global Software development; clusters; brokers; social network analysis; transactive memory systems. I. I NTRODUCTION Many studies in global software development (GSD) focus on the collaboration structures of distributed teams. Following Conway’s law [1], for instance, previous studies examine the relationship between the architectural designs of the system, the task allocation and the teams’ collaboration (e.g. [2], [3]). Other researches focus on the analysis of GSD collaboration structures using social network analysis (SNA) techniques. For example, Damian et. al. [4] use social networks to examine the dynamic nature of membership in the different stages of a multi-site software development project. Social network anlysis has also been applied in the collaboration patterns of requirements engineering among multiple development loca- tions [5]. To date, a common collaboration structure in global soft- ware development is clustering [6]. Clusters are formed within a network of interconnected members, where some members are closer to each other, creating dense subgroups. These groups are homogeneous, as their members share certain com- mon characteristics. In global software development, the most prominent characteristic is geographic distance [7], meaning the people from the same location communicate more and collaborate closer with their co-located colleagues than with their remote ones. In other collaborative environments, such as in open source software development communities, a common characteristic that brings people together into clusters can be the project that the members are working on, or shared interests such as language technologies [8]. Clusters may lead to communication and collaboration challenges, limiting expertise awareness ( [7], [9]), and con- sequently restraining the development of transactive memory (TM). Transactive memory is the memory that members of a group develop for encoding, storing and retrieving expertise knowledge within their group [10]. As Faraj & Sproull note [11] “teams must be able to manage their skill and knowledge interdependencies effectively through expertise coordination, which entails knowing where expertise is located, knowing where expertise is needed, and bringing needed expertise to bear.” In order to overcome such communication and collabo- ration challenges caused by clusters, literature suggests the positioning of a bridging role between the remote teams [12]. These bridges or brokers bring different groups together, fa- cilitate communication, improve knowledge sharing and often promote innovation [13]. In this paper, we examine the role of brokers as facilitators in the development of transactive memory (TM). We perform a case study on a multi-site project in order to answer the following questions: 1) What kind of clusters emerge in the project’s collab- oration structure? 2) Which members play the role of brokers and what are their characteristics? 3) To what extent do brokers facilitate the development of transactive memory? In the next section, we present the theoretical background of transactive memory (TM), and how we measure such memory in our case study. In section III, we discuss clusters as a collaboration structure in global software development. In section IV, we describe the role of brokers, their characteristics and contribution in coordinating clusters. In sections V and VI, we present the project overview, the data collection and we provide answers to our research questions. Finally, sections VII and VIII discuss potential threats to validity and summarize the main lessons learned as well as suggestions for future research. II. TRANSACTIVE MEMORY Transactive memory is developed for encoding, storing, and retrieving expertise knowledge between members of a group. Contrary to shared (or team) mental models, where the empha- sis is on the shared knowledge between team members (the overlapping knowledge), transactive memory focuses on the expertise knowledge, the unique knowledge that every member